FFXIV Normal Raids and Normal Raid Roulette, Explained
Normal raids are eight-player boss fights that typically slot into a rich storyline in each expansion. There are typically 12 fights to each raid series released over the span of a single expansion; each of an expansion’s three patches drops four fights.
Normal raids typically reward unique gear that are close to best-in-slot at the time of launch, and the savage difficulty versions of these fights (usually referred to as savage raids) do drop the best-in-slot gear for the time. Savage raids are typically seen as the end-game content — with ultimate raids being even harder content that only the top percentage of players complete, but those are almost an entirely separate thing.
Once the gear becomes outdated a few patches later, it’s effectively only good to be used as glamour.
Rather than getting armor pieces straight-up, you’ll get specific drops that can be traded in for gear. The normal drops trade at the following rate:
- 2 lenses/helms for head armor
- 4 shafts/armor for body armor
- 2 cranks/gauntlets for hand armor
- 4 springs/chausses for leg armor
- 2 pedals/greaves for feet armor
- 1 bolt/bangle per accessory
The most recent set of raids may have raid drop restrictions on them, meaning you can only claim one drop from each fight in that set per week. Completing the last fight in each tier for the savage raids also rewards a special mount.
Unlocking at least two raids from any series (except “The Coils of Bahamut”) will unlock normal raid roulette, which will give you EXP and other goodies in exchange for queueing into a random normal raid.
As usual with post-game content, you’ll need to beat a bulk of or all of the base game or expansion’s story to unlock it. For example, to do the Omega raids in Stormblood, you’ll need to complete the main scenario quest “Stormblood.”
Where to Unlock the A Realm Reborn Raids, ‘The Coils of Bahamut’
A Realm Reborn’s raid series is unlike any other raid in that there are 13 fights, referred to as “turns” and only four of the fights are available in savage.
To unlock the coils, talk to Urianger in The Waking Sands (Western Thanalan) to start the quest “Primal Awakening.”
You’ll unlock the first five turns, then the next four turns, and then the final four turns all at once. You can just complete the last turn in each set to complete the quest.
Note that nobody queues for the coils anymore, so to do not queue for these fights in the regular duty finder or else you will be stuck there forever waiting for people. Set up a party finder group and consider doing these fights unsynced to finish the quests.
This is also the only raid series to actually drop armor and equipment, so you don’t have to worry about trading loot in to an NPC.
Where to Unlock the Heavensward Raids, ‘Alexander’
To unlock the Alexander raids, you’ll need to talk to Slowfix in Idyllshire to start the quest “Disarmed.”
As you complete the raids and the questline, you’ll continue to unlock more and more fights, until you have all 12 unlocked.
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